Meet Michelle Bartolo / Free online yoga class below bio
Welcome to my world.
I have been practicing yoga for 23 years and teaching classes, workshops & retreats for 17 years.
I started guiding students into teachers 6 years ago
I love yoga
I love what it has taught me, what it has shown me and the people it has united me with.
I believe in the power of yoga for transformation.
What is KriyaAsana Yoga?
KriyaAsana Yoga is a combination of my two favourite practices, Vinyasa & Kundalini.
Vinyasa is a fluid practice linking one pose to the next with ease, grace & softness. Kundalini is a practice that unblocks any blocked energy in the way of emotions, traumas, grief etc. to be sure we are open and free.
The Benefits of Combining these practices:
- asana/vinyasa practice gets our energy flowing, balances our breath and creates heat in the body, stability in the mind and connection to our spirit
- asana/vinyasa opens the first layer in that leads to our nervous system
- the kriyas work very closely to our nervous system & show us where our blockages are
- kriyas are often done for longer amounts of time than the asana is held. On average the kriyas are performed from 1 – 11 minutes, they are a meditation in action.
In my personal practice of Vinyasa I noticed the physical benefits more than the spiritual benefits. Kundalini brought in the spiritual aspect of the practice and challenged my mind in a different way by sticking to the kriya for a certain amount of time.
What is a kriya? – 3HO
In Kundalini Yoga, a kriya is a specific sequence of physical actions that work toward a particular outcome. Kriya practice initiates a sequence of physical and mental changes that affect the body, mind, and spirit. There are kriyas to support the liver, balance the glandular system, stimulate the pituitary, release grief, improve our digestion and so much more. Each kriya has a different impact, but they work on all levels of your being at once.
Kriya is a Sanskrit word meaning complete action, deed, or effort. The root, kri, means to do or create. Within the context of Kundalini Yoga, kriya refers to a single or specific set of yogic exercises designed to create a predictable outcome in consciousness.
The instructions for any given kriya will include the sequence of postures and, if applicable, the suggested time in each exercise, eye focus, and accompanying breath or sound. Kriyas make up the body of most Kundalini Yoga practice. These ‘kriya sets’ work wonders on releasing our blocked energy and showing us where we are ‘stuck’. If a kriya is challenging for us then this is the one that we need to unblock whatever is making it difficult.
Wisdom of Practice
The wisdom of Kundalini Yoga is the angles of the asanas, fuelled by the breath, the repetition of mantra, and concentrated by the eye focus and body locks, which change us at the core of our being. This is empowering for the practitioner, it creates potential for real and immediate change.
The magic of Vinyasa is the wave like motion we dance through from asana to asana with ease, grace and effort. Where each pose blends into the next not knowing where we are starting from or where we stop. As energy moves in waves we create energy moving the same way.